Bistro: Café des Musées 75003

Café des Musées is the French Bistro you dreamed of in your pre-Paris dreams.

When you still believed France was the best place to eat snails or steak tartare or soufflé, before you tasted your first reheated croque monsieur on boulevard Saint-Germain.

There are so many reasons to love this place. First and foremost the produce, thoughtfully sourced and rarely interfered with. Terrines, pâtés and smoked salmon are all prepared in house (sadly this is a selling point for a Parisian bistro).

It is open seven days a week, for lunch and dinner. You can take relatively loud anglophone tourists in large groups and the staff don’t sneer, they are even helpful and whip out English menus.

And finally, a three-course no choice menu will set you back €19. And quite often the first person to greet you with a smile is the chef. Anything involving meat is generally delicious.

Impress fellow hipsters: as the name suggests, the café is walking distance to museums Carnavalet, Picasso, Cognacq-Jay and Centre Pompidou. And a stones throw from Place des Vosges, the oldest planned square in Paris.